Good morning. We’re covering Britain’s vaccine drive getting off the ground, border tensions over the virus in Southeast Asia and why Christmas trees may be getting harder to find. | |  By Melina Delkic | | | Vaccinations underway in Cardiff, Wales, on Tuesday. Andrew Testa for The New York Times | | | British regulators leapt ahead of their American counterparts, who are expected to approve the vaccine as early as this week. Prime Minister Boris Johnson said it was “amazing to see the vaccine but we can’t afford to relax now.” Hundreds of people are still dying in Britain each day from the virus. | | | The first 800,000 doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine were transported to Britain in recent days, and 50 hospitals will administer them to doctors and nurses, certain people aged 80 and over, and nursing home workers. | | | Quotable: “I feel so privileged to be the first person vaccinated against Covid-19,” said Margaret Keenan, 90, who got the first shot. “It means I can finally look forward to spending time with my family and friends in the new year after being on my own for most of the year.” | | ■ Hong Kong said it would once again ban restaurant dining after 6 p.m., and close all gyms and beauty salons, to help curb a rise in virus cases, Reuters reported. ■ Australia, where coronavirus cases are low, extended for another three months its ban on residents leaving the country, officials said Tuesday. ■ With an average of 21,000 new cases a day, California has reached a serious enough shortage of hospital beds to trigger new restrictions set by the state to slow the spread of the coronavirus. | | | The Thai border town of Mae Sot, which sits directly across the Moei River from Myawaddy, Myanmar. Adam Dean for The New York Times | | | Thai health authorities are racing in their contact-tracing efforts after at least 19 Covid-19 cases in recent weeks were linked to migrant workers who slipped through the border with Myanmar. The government has also increased military patrols and uncoiled barbed wire at some border crossing points while police officers have arrested suspected smugglers. | | | The region depends on its porous border for economic activity, but now Thai authorities are nervous that their coronavirus containment strategy, one of the world’s most successful, may be at risk. | | | Countries around the world that depend on migrant workers are blaming them for the virus spread. In Southeast Asia, China, Vietnam and Myanmar have pointed fingers at neighboring countries. | | | Concerns: Because of their uncertain status, undocumented laborers are thought to be less likely to seek medical attention when they are sick. The dangers of overlooking foreign workers were evident in Singapore, when an outbreak began in a crowded dormitory for migrants, and in Saudi Arabia, which deported migrants who had the virus. | | | Members of a lawyers’ union during a protest in Allahabad on Tuesday in support of the nationwide strike called by farmers. Sanjay Kanojia/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images | | | The police on Tuesday barricaded the residence of Arvind Kejriwal, the chief minister of Delhi, who said he had been stopped him from leaving his home because he had plans to join a protest. Opposition members in Uttar Pradesh, Punjab and Haryana said they were detained. | | | Reminder: The farmers are protesting changes that they say could slash crop prices and reduce their earnings. The government says it will increase investment. India for decades has allowed farmers to sell much of their produce to government-regulated wholesale markets. | | | Mark Lennihan/Associated Press | | | Mr. Obama wrote his first draft on yellow legal pads, doing his best work between 10 p.m. and 2 a.m. His writing was the culmination of years of inspiration from literature, he said: “When I think about how I learned to write, who I mimicked, the voice that always comes to mind the most is James Baldwin.” | | | PAID POST: A MESSAGE FROM CAMPAIGN MONITOR | | TEST: Email Marketing 101: Never Sacrifice Beauty for Simplicity | | A drag-and-drop email builder, a gallery of templates and turnkey designs, personalized customer journeys, and engagement segments. It's everything you need to create stunning, results-driven email campaigns in minutes. And with Campaign Monitor, you have access to it all, along with award-winning support around the clock. It's beautiful email marketing done simply. | | | Learn More | | | | Mount Everest: In a sign of improved relations, Nepal and China finally agreed on the exact height of the world’s tallest mountain, located on their shared border. Mount Everest is 8,848.86 meters, or 29,031.7 feet, tall, they said. That’s two feet taller than a previous measure. | | | Ian Willms for The New York Times | | | Snapshot: Above, customers lucky enough to get Christmas trees in Barrie, Ontario, on Saturday. Christmas trees are selling out in Canada and across Europe as people stuck at home in lockdown — without the family gatherings, parties and group dinners of a typical holiday season — try to shoehorn some joy into their lives. | | | What we’re reading: This feature in Outside magazine revealing the identity of the man who found the famed and much sought after Fenn treasure. Every element of this — the search, the searcher and what comes next — is a wild-goose chase. | | | Craig Lee for The New York Times | | | Cook: This buttermilk marble cake is quite simple to put together as far as cakes go, and the cream cheese chocolate frosting is a revelation. | | | Do: Pretend you’re in Dakar. It’s impossible to fully experience the West African city without making the trip, but our travel writers have come up with ways to capture at least a sliver of the magic. | | | Whether you’re in the mood for cookies or for comedies, At Home has ideas on what to read, cook, watch and do while staying safe at home. | | | The United States is facing a series of pressing problems: the economy, health care, education, social justice, climate change. Our DealBook newsletter asked experts: If you could do one thing right now to help fix America — no matter how large or small — what would it be? Here is a selection of their answers. | | | Cut carbon emissions everywhere — Hal Harvey, chief executive of Energy Innovation | | | Success starts with cutting emissions in the four energy sectors: electric utilities, vehicles, buildings and industry. All have a path to zero carbon, and none must entail sacrifice, but each requires a national commitment. There’s a common expression: “The best way to predict your future is to create it.” Let’s get going. | | | Listen to the people you disagree with the most — Heidi J. Larson, professor of anthropology at the University of London | | | For the past decade I’ve been working to “fix” the vaccine divide that has alienated friends, stressed parents and left children unprotected from disease. Tensions run deep. In those conversations, not even the best scientific evidence matters. The lessons around vaccine trust can be applied to polarization everywhere — including the power of listening. | | | So here is my proposed solution, to be applied one conversation at a time: When confronted with a different view, try to find something you can agree on. | | | Ban share buttons on social media — Kevin Roose, The Times’s technology columnist | | | Share buttons deprive us of the opportunity to make meaning out of what we share — adding the poignant caption, the funny aside, the personalized touch. They make us conduits for other people’s tastes, rather than curators of our own. By sharing less, we might actually find ourselves sharing more. | | That’s it for this briefing. See you next time. — Melina | | Thank you
Carole Landry helped write this briefing. Theodore Kim and Jahaan Singh provided the break from the news. You can reach the team at briefing@nytimes.com. | | | Were you sent this briefing by a friend? Sign up here to get the Morning Briefing. | | |
